Re-Birthday! 12 years

I'm going to go ahead and post this today, even though it's technically a few hours ahead...

Today (March 5, 2012) is my re-birthday! It's the day I get to celebrate, remember & thankfully look back twelve years ago to the early morning that I received the gift of life. I have something special that I want to share with my readers. The day that I received my heart, I was hospitalized at the University of Washington Medical Center in Seattle. I had been getting depressed because I was waiting at home but I became too sick and needed to receive constant IV medication in order to keep me going. My doctors knew that I was feeling down, so they and the social workers allowed my friends to come to my room and spend the evenings and nights with me, like a sleep over just in the hospital. It's not something they normally did, but they accommodated my friends because they knew it helped my moral. The particular evening that I found out I was getting my heart, I had a special friend spend the night with me.
     It is very difficult to describe how one feels when they find out there is a possibility of a heart match, and knowing that there would be hours of tissue type matching going on I was extremely blessed to have a friend around while I experience the emotions of amazement, excitement, worry, the what-ifs, nausea, a little sleep and oh yeah, memory loss-(Remember that one?)

     What I would like to share with you is my journal entry from the night I found out that they had a match for me. I am going to rewrite the words exactly as I wrote them in my journal so hopefully you will understand what emotions I had:


March 5, 2000

Hello!!!

It is 3:44a.m. in the morning and GUESS WHAT!? Right now I am waiting to find out if there is a good heart for me!! What happened was, around 2:30 am, two nurses came in to my room and were talking real quiet. So, I woke up and was real confused. Finally, I thought that it was real morning and time for my real blood draw. Then I looked at my watch, and realized how early it was. So I immediately asked why they were taking blood. The nurse said, "That's a good question, well, they think they might have a heart for you." and I was like "REALLY?!" So, they took 75cc's of blood, and told me that if it was a go, I would probably hear from the doctors in a couple of hours. So......I'm waiting. And waiting. And waiting, and waiting! AHHHHHH! Its driving me insane! Oh, well. Dad was totally right though, I feel like I'm not ready. Cause I got this huge rush of adrenaline, then I got totally nauseated. And now, I'm just excited!I sure hope that this works out! It would suck to have it be a false alarm. But, I have prayed and asked God to be with me and to help keep me and my family and friends calm...especially me! Well, I'll go now, and update sometime!
~

I want to write a few lines from the next journal entry, because after my transplant I sat down and finished writing what happened the rest of the morning (after all of that waiting). I've left out the name of the friend that was in the room with me because I don't have friend's permission to put it in here.

March 11, 2000

20 minutes later two well dressed nurses with white coats came walking into my room. (Friend) and I were sitting on my bed listening to music and looking at magazines. They told me that they STILL didn't know for sure if it was a "go." They said that many more tests still needed to be done before they knew if the heart was a good match or not. (I changed the last sentence so you all could understand what I meant) They also said that they needed to talk with me and my parents needed to sign papers because I was a minor, before they would take me down to the OR. They asked how far away my parents were and when they found out mom and dad were 45 minutes away they got loud and upset sounding and told me to, "Pick up the phone and call them, now." After we had a nurse get us an outside, long distance line, I was so nervous that I couldn't remember my own phone number. Luckily, (Friend) helped and called mom and dad for the docs and docs spoke with them.
     Things went fast from there. They took me down to the OR preparation room, where they began placing several IV lines and a couple of Artery lines. Mom and Dad still had not arrived yet but were getting close. They were much needed to say goodbye and to sign papers. Drugs were given to me just and mom and dad walked in so my goodbye to them was short and I only remember part of it. It's okay, though, because 11 1/2 hours, 19 1/2 units of blood, and 1 1/2 days later: I received the gift of life with a new heart!
~


No words can or will ever be able to express my thanks to my heart donor, Soji Bush.
     Soji, you and you and your family are forever in my heart and prayers. You gave me the ability to keep on living. I don't know how to express to your family how thankful that I am, except to not let this gift go to waste. To not soiling this gift with anger or resentment and filling this gift with the love of God. Thank you, truly, for a heart which has given me a chance to live.